Transport

NRMA calls time on airport traffic madness

The cries of anguish about the traffic congestion surrounding the airport have been growing for some time. Now the Canberra Times reports that the NRMA is saying “enough is enough”.

He said people were missing planes, taxis were refusing to travel to the airport and the city’s economy was suffering as a result of the congestion.

“We’ve got to see more than promises,” he said, referring to earlier commitments by the Government to fix the roads. “They’ve got to put it in this year’s budget and make it happen.”

I suggest funding it as a toll road and clip the tickets of the queanbeyanites AND all the workers at Brindabella Park (who in turn will need to be paid more, in turn driving up the cost of operating out of there).

What’s Your opinion?

Why not offer a cheap shuttle bus service to the city? In the mornings when everyone arrives, that’s where many people go anyway. The you could add a slightly less regular service direct to Woden and Belconnon (where significant business centres exist). The volume of people would justify the buses, and the reduction on cabs would mean you could actually catch one if you needed to…

The reason for the gridlock morning and evening is the rampant expansion by the Airport people, building a mini CBC, with the cynical attitude that the gov’t could wear the infrastructure improvements that would be needed.

So charging a toll for the workers who use that road would be pretty silly. Would you charge the canberrites who use the road to head out to queanbeyan? There are as many going east, as there are coming west.

The intersections can’t handle the new load, and they lock up.
The large numbers coming down Majura Road seem to add the biggest strain. some turn to go to the airport, the rest turn towards Fyshwick, and in both directions it’s jammed.

Before Brindabella Park, the drive in was pretty normal Canberra driving. Now it takes me longer to get from the airport to Barton, than it does to get from Carwoola to the aiport.

You can also see the effects at the Russell/King’s Ave roundabout, with most of the traffic heading toward Moreshead drive, disrupting the balance of the roundabout so queues build up left of this traffic.

If there is (or has been) no money in the budget to upgrade Pialligo Road to the airport, then why was there so much money WASTED on Fairbairn Avenue? It was a single lane road before, and after millions of dollars it is still a single lane road, only with pretty noise suppressing landscapeing and bike paths.

We may not be able to get to the airport on time, but at least the tourists going to Mt Ainslie can do it in style. *sigh*

Amen, Les Whinin. I just didn’t get that. Working in Campbell, I thought that the roadworks would be to make Fairbairn Ave dual lane for sure. Imagine my dissapointment when I realised that they weren’t widening any of the overpasses. And they haven’t even made them wide enough that it could be expanded at a later date.

Trouble is, any widening etc they do will not fix bottleneck problems. They need an integrated strategy, not just making a few patches of road fatter, and having the whole lot come to a screaming halt at the gridlocked intersections.

much like the screaming halt one comes to on Moreshead near the old Battle gates – the brick wall ones – when the back-up from Russell/king’s ave roundabout reaches there! You go from 80km/hr to 0 very fast.

It’s easy enough for a motivated landlord to undercut other landlords. I’d welcome a thinning-out of the cluster in Civic. I worked there last week, for the first time in many years, and getting in was horrific, parking costs were horrific.

You know what would more than likely be a step towards alleviating traffic to brindabella ?
If the car parks (which the ACT GOVERNMENT patrol and write tickets for) at Brindabella had some sort of “3 for free” scheme.
A number of people have suggested the idea to corporate, who passed it on to CAG, who say “It’s already cheaper than civic. We don’t plan to do this”
Of course it’s cheaper than civic. But the fact that there’s no other way to get here really, means everyone has to drive.
By the time #10 is complete, the existing car parks will be full.

3 for free would mean that, at a guess, there would be 50% less traffic coming out here.

Not even necessarily 3 for free, but discounted parking. Sure, they might need a booth to maintain it, but christ.

(ogh, and LESS FUCKEN ROUNDABOUTS)
i go through 14 roundabouts between the car park here, and my drive way at home.

I drove along Fairbairn Ave last night for the first time since the roadworks were finished, and was very disappointed to find it still single lane. So all we get from spending shitloads of money is some pretty walls, bike lanes and bus stops. Big woop!

What is with all the bike lanes on the roads? They’re everywhere, yet how many people do you ever see using them? One or two a week in my travels, and even that would be generous. The bike lobby obviously has some great photos of senior people in Urban Services, or whatever its called this week.

I’m not sure what kind of monster this makes me, but I had a slight smirk to myself over the weekend whist watching the news of a cyclist killed on the road whilst using the provided lane on the shoulder. Turns out he and another cyclist got a bit tangled up, sending this guy spewing forth in front of traffic. Needless to say he was killed by a big metal behemoth.

The question remains, why are cycle lanes put on the edge of the road? Seems like a completely absurd idea to me.

I’d say the reason is because it’s cheaper to slap a bike lane on top of a pre-existing road than to create a totally new bike path.

Also – roads tend to be the most direct route between two points. The bike paths we have (unless you’re lucky) tend to be fairly meandering affairs that may eventually intersect with where you want to be.